Another month has flown by, and Fearless Leader has asked me to indulge in a little statistical analysis. While all of the nifty numbers are fascinating, I think this lead image really says it all. Guns and Ammo Magazine, the self proclaimed “most popular firearms magazine,” claims a readership of 400,000 subscribers. TTAG, just this month alone, pulled in 475,489. That’s unique viewers, not just visits. The NRA’s website, for comparison, clocks in at about 40,000 visits per month. Times are good, but just how good? And are we still trending upwards?…

Um, yes. Most decidedly so.

While we didn’t post as big a jump this month as we did last month, it’s still nothing to sneeze at. We’re rapidly closing in on that magical “one million pageviews per month” number, and if things keep going the way they are we should be there by the end of the year.

What makes us even more awesome is that unlike Guns & Ammo, which is mainly distributed in the United States, TTAG is read in 184 different countries all over the world. In fact, since we’re read in every country involved with the “Arab Spring” uprisings, you could say we’re helping to topple dictators around the world.

Something we haven’t investigated yet is something that is of interest mainly to nerds, and that’s the browser and operating system of our readers. I’d love to correlate brand ownership and operating system (Mac owners prefer Glocks and Linux users prefer to build their own AR-15 or something like that), but right now all we have are the raw numbers.

Internet Explorer is the browser of choice. This leads me to believe that most of our readers are reading at work (since most IT departments use Windows and require Internet Explorer), but Firefox is a very close second. Chrome comes in third, followed by Safari right on its heels. So what about operating systems?

iPad was the big surprise for me, I didn’t expect it to be 3rd in the rankings. PS3 was another big surprise (at #9), and I have no idea how they even got here. Windows was predictably the big leader, followed by Mac.

Will we continue our meteoric climb to the top of the firearms blogs? Will Chrome finally beat out Firefox? Will I stop being such a nerd? Stay tuned…

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23 COMMENTS

  3. Nick, the PS3 has a built-in browser so you can view webpages and whatnot. It’s quite clunky to use with the game controller but Sony has an attachment that turns the controller into a controller-with-little-keyboard (few people in the US purchased it, but it’s more popular overseas). The people using that probably just like to read it on their flatscreen from the comfort of their couch… Or they don’t have any other computer. It’s been removed, but you used to be able to load Linux on the PS3 and use it as a home computer. It was something Sony touted as a feature when it came out but since deactivated because they said it was being used to pirate games.

    I’ll admit to being responsible for both Firefox/Windows & Android numbers.

  4. Will I stop being such a nerd?

    I think you’re required by contract to keep being a nerd for the good of TTAG 😀

  5. of interest mainly to nerds

    I’m offended. (and since I’m using HTML tags, it must also be accurate).

    The only IE hits you’ll get because of me are from the articles I refer to friends and family. I’m squarely in the Chrome/Firefox/Android/(and occasional iPad) camp.

    And for those who don’t know, TTAG comes up in a very nice, clean interface inside mobile browsers.

    • But the comments don’t. The mobile view doesn’t do comment threading, and my phone does not like commenting while using the desktop version of the site; Hell, my desktop doesn’t even like playing in the comments sometimes…

  6. A tribute to the community and the effective way RF manages to both keep us civil and his writers interesting. RF’s TTAC was, and is, the best car site, and he has duplicated that success with TTAG. Though my views are not in synch with many other readers here, I always visit the site because of three things: my views will be challenged in reasonably cordial manner; I learn a great deal about firearms from very learned enthusiasts; and the articles tend to be well written and well thought out.

    • “I always visit the site because of three things: my views will be challenged in reasonably cordial manner”

      This is just further evidence of the truth of Heinlein’s first law: An armed society is a polite society.

  7. first off, this is awesome news! the unique variety of the content TTAG (and underemphasis on politics outside of what impacts 2A rights, plenty of other places for that.)
    the international viewers is particularly interesting, as TTAG provides insight into American firearms culture.

  10. “Will I stop being such a nerd?” Don’t ever change, Nick, great work!

    What happens when you hit the magic number?

  11. dude, posting your stats every month is a douchey move. It makes you look like you are blogging just for the numbers. Once in awhile, eh, I can see that. But every month? You should just take pictures of your eDick and post those while you’re at it.

    • TFB and ENDO kill him in traffic and they don’t gloat. I agree it’s douchey, but hey this is how the site gained notoriety and why no one likes the writers.

  13. What’s interesting to me on the computer stats is that the OS X/iOS stats total almost 20%, which leaves a whopping 3.07% for “other” – Linux, Android, Symbian, et cetera. Even more impressive is that Macs alone make up almost 14% of readership. Two years ago, the numbers likely would have been around 9% for OS X and iPhones combined. iPads really are changing the way people interact with the Internet, and the halo effect for Macs in general seems to be picking up steam.

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